The dataset in scope was four years of data - 2018, 2019, 2022 and 2023 - summarising 52654 instances in which Victoria Police stopped and searched individuals without a warrant. The legal basis of the stop and search was a ‘reasonable grounds’ for the officer to suspect that the person was in possession of one of the following items:
The dataset includes individual searches and includes a range of information such as racial appearance of the person being searched, item suspected to be present, whether a prohibited item was found, rank of officer, reporting station and whether the search related to a person ‘P’ or a vehicle ‘V’.
Note that 2020 and 2021 data is not included in this analysis due to the extraordinary circumstances of the COVID 19 pandemic. Stop and search data from this period is not a sound basis for which to make inferences about stop and search behaviour, including profiling, in non-pandemic periods.
One way that racial profiling by police can be identified is through examining the reasonableness of police searches. For the searches examined by this analysis, police are not authorised to search a person unless they hold a suspicion, based on reasonable grounds, that a person is in possession of a prohibited item. When police perform a ‘reasonable grounds’ search we can infer (it is only an inference) that it is more likely the police had reasonable grounds for suspicion if they ‘find’ a contraband item following the search. This inference is not reasonable in individual cases and there are many examples of police finding a contraband item following an unreasonable search. However, over a large number of searches, the find rate provides a widely accepted mechanism to assess the overall reasonableness of police searches.
In the years in scope, 17.1 percent of ‘reasonable grounds’ searches resulted in a ‘find’. The number of searches varied minimally over the period.
| Year | Total searches | Finds | Hit rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 12841 | 2275 | 17.7 |
| 2019 | 13281 | 2366 | 17.8 |
| 2022 | 14987 | 2453 | 16.4 |
| 2023 | 11545 | 1958 | 17.0 |
Victoria Police records the ethnic appearance of the people that they search without warrant. The racial appearance of persons who were subject to a search used in this analysis appears in Figure 1 below. The groupings were consistent with the current racial appearance categories used by Victoria Police.
A total of 10,657 search records, or twenty percent of all records, did not have any racial appearance data entered, despite this field being mandatory. Records where the officer was unable to determine the racial appearance were marked as ‘Other’.
Note that the aggregation of persons of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern appearance into a single category presents a challenge, as we would ordinarily expect persons of Italian, Greek, Croatian ancestry etc to be considered ‘non-racialised’, whereas persons in the Middle Eastern appearance would be more likely to be considered racialised, and potentially subject to islamophobia, depending on faith. The Police Accountability Project urges Victoria Police to disaggregate these categories.
Note also that police perception of racial appearance will not identify police-targeting of white appearing Aboriginal people. The results for Aboriginal people therefore must be read with caution.
Analysing police search decisions in response to police perception of a person’s racial background is a reasonable method for detecting bias in people whose ethnicity corresponds to appearance.
The hit rate by racial appearance is summarised in Table X below
| Racial appearance | Hit rate | Finds | Total searches |
|---|---|---|---|
| White | 18.0 | 3474 | 19325 |
| Middle Eastern/Med | 13.8 | 551 | 3999 |
| Asian | 13.7 | 301 | 2190 |
| African | 12.9 | 217 | 1677 |
| Aboriginal | 15.6 | 151 | 966 |
| Pacific Islander | 18.8 | 146 | 776 |
| South Asian | 13.9 | 98 | 704 |
| South American | 15.7 | 18 | 115 |
| Other | 15.8 | 124 | 785 |
| Missing | 18.0 | 3972 | 22117 |
## `summarise()` has grouped output by 'Year'. You can override using the
## `.groups` argument.
| Variable | Stats / Values | Freqs (% of Valid) | Graph | Missing | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Area.type [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Unit.type [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Contact.Type [factor] |
|
|
4162 (7.9%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Racial.appearance [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gender [factor] |
|
|
15566 (29.6%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rank.of.Member [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Any.items.found [factor] |
|
|
0 (0.0%) |
Generated by summarytools 1.0.1 (R version 4.4.1)
2024-09-24
An analysis of the hit-rate for features of interest appears below.
label | variable | Any.items.found | Total | test | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
0 | 1 | ||||
Racial.appearance | Aboriginal | 815 (84.4%) | 151 (15.6%) | 966 (1.8%) | p value: <0.0001 |
African | 1460 (87.1%) | 217 (12.9%) | 1677 (3.2%) | ||
Asian | 1889 (86.3%) | 301 (13.7%) | 2190 (4.2%) | ||
Middle Eastern/Med | 3448 (86.2%) | 551 (13.8%) | 3999 (7.6%) | ||
Missing | 18145 (82.0%) | 3972 (18.0%) | 22117 (42.0%) | ||
Other | 661 (84.2%) | 124 (15.8%) | 785 (1.5%) | ||
Pacific Islander | 630 (81.2%) | 146 (18.8%) | 776 (1.5%) | ||
South American | 97 (84.3%) | 18 (15.7%) | 115 (0.2%) | ||
South Asian | 606 (86.1%) | 98 (13.9%) | 704 (1.3%) | ||
White | 15851 (82.0%) | 3474 (18.0%) | 19325 (36.7%) | ||
Total | 43602 (82.8%) | 9052 (17.2%) | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Unit.type | CIU | 1695 (85.6%) | 284 (14.4%) | 1979 (3.8%) | p value: <0.0001 |
DRU | 1536 (88.4%) | 201 (11.6%) | 1737 (3.3%) | ||
Highway Patrol | 374 (66.1%) | 192 (33.9%) | 566 (1.1%) | ||
Other | 1742 (83.2%) | 351 (16.8%) | 2093 (4.0%) | ||
PSO | 639 (66.7%) | 319 (33.3%) | 958 (1.8%) | ||
Public Order Response | 4018 (86.0%) | 655 (14.0%) | 4673 (8.9%) | ||
Transit | 2821 (75.1%) | 934 (24.9%) | 3755 (7.1%) | ||
Uniform | 30777 (83.4%) | 6116 (16.6%) | 36893 (70.1%) | ||
Total | 43602 (82.8%) | 9052 (17.2%) | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Gender | F | 5999 (86.1%) | 966 (13.9%) | 6965 (18.8%) | p value: <0.0001 |
M | 24873 (82.6%) | 5233 (17.4%) | 30106 (81.2%) | ||
U | 17 (100.0%) | 0 (0%) | 17 (0.05%) | ||
NA | 12713 | 2853 | 15566 | ||
Total | 43602 (82.8%) | 9052 (17.2%) | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Year | 2018 | 10566 (82.3%) | 2275 (17.7%) | 12841 (24.4%) | p value: 0.0033 |
2019 | 10915 (82.2%) | 2366 (17.8%) | 13281 (25.2%) | ||
2022 | 12534 (83.6%) | 2453 (16.4%) | 14987 (28.5%) | ||
2023 | 9587 (83.0%) | 1958 (17.0%) | 11545 (21.9%) | ||
Total | 43602 (82.8%) | 9052 (17.2%) | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Area.type | Metro | 22792 (83.9%) | 4371 (16.1%) | 27163 (51.6%) | p value: <0.0001 |
Regional | 20810 (81.6%) | 4681 (18.4%) | 25491 (48.4%) | ||
Total | 43602 (82.8%) | 9052 (17.2%) | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
An analysis of the percentage with racial appearance data missing by chara
label | variable | Racial.appearance.missing | Total | test | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Missing | Not missing | NA | ||||
Search.type | Drugs | 9564 (26.5%) | 26523 (73.5%) | 10753 | 46840 (89.0%) | p value: <0.0001 |
Firearms | 211 (34.2%) | 406 (65.8%) | 97 | 714 (1.4%) | ||
Graffiti | 90 (11.2%) | 710 (88.8%) | 119 | 919 (1.7%) | ||
Volatile inhalation substance | 3 (14.3%) | 18 (85.7%) | 5 | 26 (0.05%) | ||
Weapons | 789 (21.5%) | 2880 (78.5%) | 486 | 4155 (7.9%) | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Year | 2018 | 0 (0%) | 7011 (100.0%) | 5830 | 12841 (24.4%) | p value: <0.0001 |
2019 | 0 (0%) | 7651 (100.0%) | 5630 | 13281 (25.2%) | ||
2022 | 6037 (40.3%) | 8950 (59.7%) | 0 | 14987 (28.5%) | ||
2023 | 4620 (40.0%) | 6925 (60.0%) | 0 | 11545 (21.9%) | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Area.type | Metro | 5454 (26.4%) | 15230 (73.6%) | 6479 | 27163 (51.6%) | p value: 0.0205 |
Regional | 5203 (25.4%) | 15307 (74.6%) | 4981 | 25491 (48.4%) | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Region | Eastern Region | 2284 (29.9%) | 5350 (70.1%) | 2133 | 9767 (26.5%) | p value: <0.0001 |
North West Metro Region | 3165 (25.3%) | 9368 (74.7%) | 4026 | 16559 (44.9%) | ||
Southern Metro Region | 1324 (28.0%) | 3406 (72.0%) | 1337 | 6067 (16.4%) | ||
Western Region | 1067 (29.6%) | 2540 (70.4%) | 893 | 4500 (12.2%) | ||
NA | 2817 | 9873 | 3071 | 15761 | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Gender | F | 710 (11.1%) | 5671 (88.9%) | 584 | 6965 (18.8%) | p value: 0.0006 |
M | 2666 (9.7%) | 24856 (90.3%) | 2584 | 30106 (81.2%) | ||
U | 3 (23.1%) | 10 (76.9%) | 4 | 17 (0.05%) | ||
NA | 7278 | 0 | 8288 | 15566 | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
Any.items.found | 0 | 8820 (25.7%) | 25457 (74.3%) | 9325 | 43602 (82.8%) | p value: 0.1523 |
1 | 1837 (26.6%) | 5080 (73.4%) | 2135 | 9052 (17.2%) | ||
Total | 10657 (25.9%) | 30537 (74.1%) | 11460 | 52654 (100.0%) | ||
## `summarise()` has grouped output by 'Area.type', 'Local.Government.Area',
## 'Total.searches', 'LGA.Hit.rate'. You can override using the `.groups`
## argument.